Take a Swig of the good stuff…..Street Trash Style!

If you haven’t guessed it already I love crap horror films, actually now that I mention it I enjoy and get a kick out of just cheesy badly made films and more likely then not, I have been covering some of my favourites and some of my guilty pleasures, and there are many more I hope to cover. But now there is one that falls into both of my camps, it is at times badly made, badly acted and downright nasty while at others it is hysterically over the top while having myself (along with a few select friends that know and appreciate it) roll around on the floor in laughter. Now since it is getting its fully uncut DVD release in the UK the beginning of next week, it seems oddly apt that I should cover a trashy cult favourite. Say hello to the second best melting classic “Street Trash” (the other would go to Larry Cohen’sThe Stuff), so take a swig of that special Viper brew and prepare to have your heart melt for this cult flick.

Unlike a lot of fans for Street Trash I was not fortunate to have grown up with this incredibly mental yet oddly compelling piece of crap (I was lucky to have that happen with the evil dead films, the leprechaun series and several other well known cult films) but it is still an entertaining piece of crap never the less and was lucky to have been handed a old video copy by a university friend in our first year of our film course. The cover was an old cardboard slipcase, beautifully preserved by my friend; it felt as though I was holding a valuable piece of rare film history and felt honoured to have my hands finally on it after years of waiting. But it held yet further delights for the cover was both seedy and revoltingly gooey at the same time, which only inflamed my need to watch it more as it genuinely excited me, here is a cover I first saw and I can image you are not nearly as excited as I was. To me my friend allowed me to be privy to a rare cult film hard to find in England at the point, I might have been a tad over excited.

Written by Roy Frumkes director and writer of The Document of the Dead documentary which is one of the best behind the scenes docs to be produced about a horror film (next to Apocalypse Soon: the making of Citizen Toxie: the toxic avenger part 4). The loose plot centres around a bunch of Junkyard tramps that happen to be swigging a bottle of toxic wine called Viper which melts very messily its drinkers into pools of multicoloured goo. Two hobo brothers try to avoid the effects of the brew while at the same time avoiding the psychopathic tendencies of a Vietnam vet called Bronson. Basically the film is a mess from a narrative perspective, but it is so off the wall and unbelievably crazy you can not help but instantly like it, if that is your sort of thing thankfully for myself and a few friends that is the case.

Released in 1987 it quickly became notorious within the UK because of, how shall we say, un-pc moments which happen within the films story, I use story loosely because even to this day I still have no idea what is happening within the film, its just a film of happenings and no real plot to speak of (but I think that is why it endears its self to me). The particular scenes I am referring too include the tramps of the junk yard gang raping a female tramp (not exactly pleasant viewing, but then again it is hard to work out that is what happens), while another scene has one of the local junk yard tramps pissing through a hole only to (excuse the pun) piss off the local crazy tramp who promptly cuts his penis off. Now this would be in complete bad taste if it was not so damn darkly funny as the other junk yard residents play “hot potato” with the severed john thomas as his rightful owner scrambles around trying to catch it, it really is purely played for laughs.

The only real down side to this film is the melting, there are probably about three good melting sequences (the best is still the toilet one) and it spends a little too long getting to the downright crazy stuff and then suddenly ends. But saying all that it is still an interesting film to behold and better still show to people who are as like minded enough to appreciate its absolutely unique appeal. It won’t ever win any awards for class or style but by god it’s a bloody good laugh all the same. Now the question is are you willing to take a sip of the good stuff and travel down to where the Street Trash dwell?……I thought so, enjoy (insert an evil laugh of your choice here)